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Chicken a LA King

A creamy chicken dish served over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mushroom and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Chicken a LA King

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a pan until browned.

  2. Add the chopped green pepper and cook for about 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in the flour and salt, cooking until frothy.

  4. Add the cream and stir until the sauce thickens.

Finish and serve

  1. Set the sauce over hot water and add the cooked mushrooms.

  2. Stir in the cooked chicken cubes.

  3. Serve the mixture on toast.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Mushroom + chickentop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds fat and richness, and its browning gives the sauce a nutty flavour.
Flour
Thickens the sauce by forming a starch network with the fat and liquid.
Cream
Provides the liquid base and richness that the flour thickens into a smooth sauce.
Cooked chicken
Supplies the main protein and substance of the dish.
Cooked mushrooms
Add earthy flavour and a soft, meaty texture to the sauce.
Green pepper
Adds fresh, slightly bitter vegetable flavour and a little texture.

The step that matters

Thickening the sauce. Flour must cook in the butter until frothy before the cream is added, so its starch can thicken the liquid smoothly without lumps. Add the cream gradually and keep stirring while the sauce thickens.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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